Product Description

This book is a New York Times Bestseller. 'Conventional analysis suffers from a profound failure of imagination. It imagines passing clouds to be permanent and is blind to powerful, long-terms shifts taking place in full view of the world' - George Friedman. In his long-awaited and provocative new book, George Friedman turns his eye on the future - offering a lucid, highly readable forecast of the changes we can expect around the world during the twenty-first century. He explains where and why future wars will erupt (and how they will be fought), which nations will gain and lose economic and political power, and how new technologies and cultural trends will alter the way we live in the new century. "The Next 100 Years" draws on a fascinating exploration of history and geopolitical patterns dating back hundreds of years. Friedman shows that we are now, for the first time in half a millennium, at the dawn of a new era - with changes in store, including: The US-jihadist war will conclude, replaced by a second full-blown cold war with Russia; China will undergo a major extended internal crisis, and Mexico will emerge as an important world power; a new global war will unfold between the United States and an unexpected coalition from Eastern Europe, Eurasia, and the Far East; but armies will be much smaller and wars will be less deadly; and the United States will experience a golden age in the second half of the century.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #29414 in Books
• Published on: 2009-07-03
• Binding: Hardcover
• 272 pages

Review
'Fascinating because of its dismissal of the conventional wisdom' New York Post 'Mr Friedman's work warrants the investment of an evening of careful reading' Washington Times

Customer Reviews

Thoughtful Geopolitical Scenarios Developed 70 Years into the Future

No one can forecast what the weather will be next week in most parts of the world, why would anyone think that forecasting what nations will do in detail over 70 years is possible? George Friedman doesn't think it's possible either, but the exercise presents the opportunity to identify sources of potential future conflicts and alliances on the geopolitical stage. Thinking about those issues is well worth considering. An ounce of prevention may just help avoid tons of regret in some cases.

George Friedman believes that considerations of potential military defense and offense, access to needed raw materials and markets, demographics, political strengths and weaknesses, technology, and national economic interests can be combined to imagine how future leaders will see their situations and how well they will be able to handle old and new challenges vis-à-vis their neighbors and competitors. From those sources, he identifies factors that will probably be important which include:

1. Increasing importance of having access to shipping via the oceans due to ever-expanding global trade.

2. Continued U.S. dominance of the oceans.

3. Political and social weaknesses in China and Russia that will cause those nations to weaken and fragment.

4. Decline in population size in developed countries requiring pro-immigration strategies to stay competitive.

5. Emergence of space-based warfare and energy generation to shift the basis of national competition.

6. Robotics replacing less-skilled workers throughout the world creating a wave of unemployment.

7. Aggressive geographical expansions of influence by nations which are bounded by weak countries.

8. A continued dominance by the United States except in controlling the regions in the country that are filled with Mexican-Americans.

As a result, he projects an end to armed conflicts between Muslims and Americans on religious grounds; a new cold war with Russia; fragmentation of China's economic power and military strength; the rise of regional power in nations like Turkey, Japan, and Poland; a space-based war aimed at the United States by Japan and Turkey; the rise of space-based energy as the economic underpinning of prosperity; and a civil crisis in the Southwestern U.S.

Who knows if these things will happen? They could.

I felt that the main weakness in his argument was failing to consider the possible development of a strong regional block involving both North and South America over the next 20 years. Such a block would have tremendous access to technology, resources, positive demographics, and be easier to keep secure than trying to project power around the world. With such a strong base, many of the issues that concern Mr. Friedman about U.S. interests would be considerably less pressing. If the U.S. were not as aggressive in Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, some of the conflicts described in this book would be less likely to occur.

I was also surprised to see that the book doesn't make much of Africa as a source of future geopolitical challenges. With rapid population growth expected in a large population and lots of valuable resources at stake, you can certainly build a case that competition for African resources can lead to a lot of geopolitical instability.

Historians are fond of saying that history repeats itself. You can see an example in Germany being involved in playing a major role in the early stages of the first and second world wars. Mr. Friedman takes the repetition concept and applies it by assuming that Japan will repeat a Pearl-Harbor-like sneak attack on the United States. I think he could just as easily argue that Germany will start another European war, but he doesn't think the demographics favor that.

Ultimately, this book assumes that nations won't get any better at resolving their problems peacefully in ways to produce more social and economic benefits for everyone. I hope that assumption is mistaken.

Bold and daring
One of the things which attracts me to this author is he explains why things happen as they do, in objective terms. His work "America's Secret War" is so far the only explanation I've found of why America was attacked on 9/11, why they subsequently went to war in Afghanistan and why they later went to war in Iraq. There are many works, some good and some little better than angry rants, pointing out the obvious ethical and tactical flaws in US actions, but very few actually say why it happened and what the objectives were. This is Friedman's greatest strength and why I find his books, including this one, entertaining.

In this work he challenges your held perceptions that many of the things he predicts are too far fetched to be plausible by reminding us that the disintegration of the USSR was "too far fetched" a view in 1979, but 15 years later it was over and accepted as reality.

Whether some of his seemingly outlandish predictions will happen is matter for time but that's not necessarily the aim of the book. It is very well written work on why countries act the way they do on the world stage, bound as they are by geopolitical reality, which in turn is shaped by fundamentals such as geography, culture, mineral wealth and the like and thus what we can deduce a country might do, constrained as it is. He backs his statements with reasons and logic, and while some may regard the work as US-centric, he is not shy of some harsh statements of his fellow citizens and government.

The first part of the book establishes the actions of the world's most important players (past and present) and this was the best of the book for me. It gives a great understanding of the foundations of US (and other great world powers) foreign policy and thus, why these government act as they do. He then explains why other nations bind together to try to contain the US and thus, we have the great game.

The latter part of the book is an attempt to predict the future, based on the actions of how the US (which incidentally he describes as a barbarous country) will attempt to maintain it's position as the global power, and how other countries will either bend with this or resist, for their own rational reasons. This part will appear far fetched to many (including me I must say) but if you ignore the details a little and forget the science fiction and remember he is trying to give you the tone of the next 100 years, it's worth reading.

Taken together you have an good opinion on the tone that the next 100 years will take, in a broad sense and a good work on the framework by which geopolitics works. Very enjoyable.

Far Fetched ...
An interesting read, from someone who is obviously Pro-American. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but the author is far too optimist about America's future. He mentions that America's vast industrial capacity will enable it to win future wars. What industrial capacity? At present, the Americans have outsourced most of their industry to Mexico and China.
As for his predictions about Europe, he ignores that fact that Muslim immigration, combined with a negative birth rate of Europeans, will result in Europe becoming an Islamic entity, possibly as soon as the year 2050. This will spell disaster for the United States, which is the only nation that supports Israel.
His premise that America's future conflicts will be about mineral rights is way off base; America's future conflicts will be over it's unilateral support of the State of Israel.